Monday, January 2, 2017


While I haven't been to active on social media, I've been actively stitching away while turning into a ROKU zombie.  Honestly, at first I found ROKU to be a blessing...no more of those 15 commercial breaks, but I'm now addicted to it and have found myself sitting in front of it for endless hours and while I'm stitching....it's an enormous time suck.  I have a plan though to get back to work.  Back to getting out of the house periodically.  Of course, as of Thanksgiving I am back to work 4 days a week in Salty Yarns so that will be helpful.  Sara gave me the class schedule for March and April and I got that up on the web site today and because the update to that has become such a problem it took me 2 hours to do what it use to take me 1/2 hr to do, but at least I'm away from the T.V.  So perhaps I will get more done now and this is my start.  "Witches Night Out" was one of With Thy Needle and Threads designs, which for those of you who don't know me, is a favorite of mine especially when I can stitch them on the large count fabrics (this is a 16 ct. Legacy linen) so the design which would normally be small enough for a pin cushion becomes big enough to be a banner.  Plus I had the metal stand to put it on so it was a win win.  Loved stitching it and do so using Weeks Dye Works and DMC Perle Cottons.  Fun, Fun, Fun.  I highly recommend you do this periodically especially after a time consuming major project.  Anyway, I didn't even add embellishments to this one which was unusual, but I did satin stitch the pumpkins on the ground.  I love the dimension it added.  The second piece is another Old Colonial Polish Pottery piece.  It has a dear little blue bird stitched over one on it, but I didn't want to show it from the top because the finishing wasn't as perfect as I've managed to do on the other 2 Polish Pottery pieces.  I worked and worked and worked, but never got all the creases out around the edge.  But love my Polish Pottery so if you are loving it too you want to get in on this craze now as they are limited and while we had 24 we are down to 6 in only a very short time. Well that's it for today.  I'll try to post again tomorrow before I report first to the doctor's for a physical (that should put me in a bad mood) and then report for 2 days of active grandmothering duty so that Mary and Brian can get away for a couple of days to celebrate their 10th anniversary.  This will be the first time both parents have been away at the same time.  I'm not expecting problems and let's face it with school in session I do get the daytime off, so I figure it's only first thing in the morning and after 4 in the afternoon, and if they go to bed around 8...well that's shouldn't be too exhausting.  I'm pretty sure I'll have to time to stitch though so this could spell trouble for me.  Anyway, if I can I'll report in periodically to let you know how it's going.  Hope you are having a great week.  Well I wrote the previous part of this blog before Thanksgiving and it's now the day after New Years.  I certainly have taken a break from everything constructive, but hopefully I'm getting back on track.  I have a bet with one of the stitchers that attends our retreats and so I'm working on that piece.  She was struggling to finish a piece and I have been struggling with this needlepoint piece.  It's not that either piece was hard, just pieces we both kept putting down and working on something else.  So the bet is, we each put up $25.00 and the person who finishes their piece gets to keep all the money.  If neither of us finish...well no one gets the money, and if both finish we each keep the money.  I'm determined and I'm sure she is too, so while no money might exchange hands it's still a win win because we will both have finished projects we struggled with.  I had a wonderful Christmas and got wonderful gifts from the family but also from stitchers.  I only hope you had as wonderful a Christmas as I did.  We also had several days of beautiful balmy weather...more like spring than winter, but today it's gloomy and wet outside and they are also talking about snow flurries by the end of the week....of course we expect more rain but no snow so we're not too worried about the prediction.  But mercy I looked at the weather some of you are experiencing and can't imagine having to deal with that much snow.  While I love staying home, it's easy to love when you know you can get in your car anytime and go to the store with no weather issues, snow banks or anything else.  When it snows here I don't get in my car, hell I don't leave my house I'm so afraid of falling.  Snow is not a fun time for me unless my refrigerator is fully stocked and the snow is gone in a few days.  Anyway, just wanted you to know I'm alive, well and living my dream in Ocean City.  Stay warm and hope to see you in 2017.

7 comments:

Syd said...

Happy New Year, Sally!

Sally Rutka said...

Hi Syd,

Happy New Year to you as well. Hope 2017 brings you good health, happiness and hopefully a million dollars. Wouldn't that be perfect. You'd be able to buy all the needlework you could ever want. Hope to see you this year. In the meantime stay safe.

Lynn said...

Good to see you again Sally!

Debbie B said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Debbie B said...

Happy New Year, Sally! I see you got a little bit more than flurries down there! Stay in and stay safe.

Sally Rutka said...

Hi Debbie,

I've really haven't done much stitching....I need to throw away this IPad I purchased for the shop...what a joke that's become. But we're in the shop with a lot of stitchers from Camp Wannastitch today and I'm getting inspired to stitch now to find the perfect project.....like I don't have many perfect projects at home. But so far I'm still finding different ways of not stitching.

Sally Rutka said...

Hi Lynn,

It's always great to see stitching friends. It just makes the day seem brighter. We love it when you come in..Have a great winter until we see you again.